Month: August 2009

Snippet from the article:

When laser therapy, scalp massages and dietary supplements didn’t work, two clients of Deerfield-based Natural Hair Growth Institute held out their hands for a refund.

Now the two former clients, Virgus Jacques and Margaret Farrell, have filed a class action breach-of-contract and consumer fraud lawsuit against the company, saying they’re part of a larger group that used the program, saw no success and, ultimately, didn’t get their thousands of dollars back despite a guarantee.

“NHGI’s routine practice of informing its customers that they will be refunded the total cost of the program if there is no hair growth progress by the program end — when NHGI has no intention of refunding the money — and telling clients that the program is virtually always successful — when the program many times does not work — deceives customers,” the suit states.

Read the full article at SunTimes.com

I wonder at times if there is justice in this world and the lawyers do level the playing field. Based on the lawsuit, it sounds like this is one of those cases where the refund guarantee wasn’t worth anything and these consumers were out a nice chunk of money ($11,000 for one… nearly $9000 for the other).

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Hey Doc, no surgeon would give an approximate number of grafts you may need so that I can calculate the costs of a hair transplant. I found various hair calculators on different web-sites. How good are these in answering that question for me?

There is a science called multi-variant analysis based upon our ability to take complex variables and put them together to get a better understanding of complexity. Estimating the number of hair grafts for a balding pattern is such a complex problem, as the variables include less than pristine numbers. The variables include:

1. Thickness of the hair shaft (fine, medium, or coarse)
2. Color of the hair (white, blond, red, brown, black)
3. Color of the skin (very light, various shades of olive, ruddy, pigmented from light to dark)
4. Character of the hair (wavy – straight)
5. Density of the donor hair
6. Degree of hair loss in the patterns under analysis
7. Size of the balding area
8. Size of the head
9. Looseness of the donor scalp (for strip surgery)
10. FOX biopsy status (for FUE)

To show the difficulty of the analysis, lets look at an example “average” head size, white skin, and black very fine hair. Let’s make our patient a Class 3A pattern (see diagram at right). With very fine hair, to fill in this area, it may take between 5000-6000 follicular units, but by just increasing the hair shaft thickness from fine to medium coarse, the same size area may only require about 2500 follicular units, substantially less than the same size area with very fine hair. Even with that said, the way the hair is distributed by the surgeon will dictate what the final results will look like. The calculators offered for estimating hair graft numbers clearly do not apply, because the multi-variant analysis is far too complex.

With that said, let take what the surgeon does as an art form and you are his canvas. Like a good artist, a good surgeon can get the best out of his working material… but unlike a canvas, what you get from a hair transplant surgeon is with you for the rest of your life. You will see it in the mirror every morning and your wife, children, or the business people you deal with will also see it. If they even look at your hair, your cover is blown and it may not be repairable. So just how many grafts do you need? So while these online calculators might be a fun marketing gimmick, the answers are clearly not calculable by a simple graft calculator.

Is there a difference between rinsing your hair in soft water opposed to hard water? I have hard water were I live and my parents have soft. When I visit my parents I notice my hair seems healthier and more manageable after taking a shower using soft water.

Yes, there is a difference between hard and soft water. If you should get my book you will read about the changes that happen to the hair when it is wet and washed. Soft water penetrates the hair shaft better and causes it to remold itself, while hard water does not penetrate the hair shaft well. I spent an entire chapter on hair physiology so I really can’t rewrite it here.

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Snippet from the article:

A Chicago-area company that converted strands of Ludwig van Beethoven’s hair into diamonds will soon use the same process on the hair of another music icon — Michael Jackson.

A lock of Jackson’s hair that was charred during the infamous filming of a 1984 Pepsi commercial could produce up to 10 half-carat diamonds, said Greg Herro, CEO of LifeGem.

The hair will be heated to about 5,400 degrees, reducing it to carbon so it can be crystallized and turned into diamonds — a patented process that takes six to nine months, Herro said.

Read the full article at the Chicago Tribune

I’ve heard of this carbonization process being done to hair before, but I didn’t know someone had kept a lock of Michael Jackson’s burnt hair for 25 years. The hair was purchased from a collector… and this is the 2nd time that collector has had celebrity hair for sale for this diamond-making process. Is this really a hobby? If so, I hope it has reached its peak.

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